Mobile Museums of Tolerance bus to come to Aurora church Sunday

The Mobile Museums of Tolerance bus is coming to the New England Congregational Church in Aurora on Sunday.

The Mobile Museums of Tolerance are free education centers that use technology and interactive programming to offer lessons about antisemitism and prejudice, according to their website. They’ve been around since 2021, and have come to Aurora and nearby cities on several occasions, such as a visit to the Aurora Public Library West Branch back in 2023.

The program first launched in Illinois, according to its website, and is in connection to the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles, a part of Jewish human rights organization the Simon Wiesenthal Center. The program now offers lessons in several states.

Workshops take place in a 30-seat, wheelchair accessible vehicle and are led by a licensed Illinois educator, the website says. The workshops are in partnership with the Illinois Department of Human Rights’ Commission on Discrimination and Hate Crimes.

In addition to offering lessons at schools, the website says, the Mobile Museums of Tolerance also appear at community spaces like libraries, synagogues and churches.

Residents can visit the bus on Sunday at New England Congregational Church at 406 W. Galena Blvd. in Aurora. The bus will have an open house for members of the church’s congregation and the general public from 9 to 10 a.m., and again from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., according to Rick Guzman, co-chair of the church’s Social and Racial Justice Committee and executive director of the Neighbor Project, an Aurora-based social services organization.

The church will also be hosting a program on the bus for middle and high school students in the congregation on Sunday.

The committee Guzman oversees at the church was formed after the events of 2020 and the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, and they aim to offer educational programming for the community, like the Mobile Museums of Tolerance.

“The timing of this certainly feels like a good time to be opening up and thinking about a variety of perspectives,” Guzman told The Beacon-News on Thursday, but he said they had this program in the works for some time now. They hope to host the bus again as part of an interfaith service in the future.

mmorrow@chicagotribune.com